


An Unused Ache

by nothing_rhymes_with_ianto



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-11
Updated: 2013-04-11
Packaged: 2017-12-08 04:08:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/756865
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nothing_rhymes_with_ianto/pseuds/nothing_rhymes_with_ianto
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Grantaire is used to being lonely.</p>
            </blockquote>





	An Unused Ache

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote a depressing little Grantaire thing.

Grantaire is a lonely person. He’s not in any sort of denial— he knows this about himself quite well. It’s partly self-induced; he’s never really been a people person, and he prefers to be alone more often than not. Sure, he hangs out at bars and sits with his friends at meetings, but he often feels more alone in a crowd than he ever could by himself in his dark little bedroom. When he’s alone he can drink to his heart’s content without someone harping on him to ease up a little. He can prance around his flat naked and watched silly television shows and talk out loud at his laptop without disturbing anyone. He likes being alone.  
   
But, well, sometimes he sits at meetings and wonders what it would be like to be Jehan and Courfeyrac, or Joly and Bossuet, what it would be like to never be alone. And sometimes, he’s walking home in the wee hours or curled up in his bed with his laptop and he craves company. He craves touch. His chest aches for contact. He wants to curl around something living that isn’t just his cat. He desperately wants to hold someone close, to feel arms around his body, to press his face against someone’s neck and just breathe. He wants to be vulnerable in front of someone, wants to press his fingers against muscle and skin, wants to feel human warmth through the thin cloth of his shirt. He’d even settle for an arm slung across his back, or a hand on his shoulder. His whole body aches for that presence, that pressure, the feeling of a touch. His skin prickles with longing, his fingers itch for contact.  
   
Then he remembers who he is, that he’s alone and aloof and people would laugh at him or back away if he tried to touch. He’s awkward, he’s antisocial, he doesn’t know how to act around people, he doesn’t know how he’d ever even initiate something like that. He doesn’t know what he’d do if he was allowed to touch, if he allowed himself to keep from automatically pulling away the way he’s done his whole life despite his craving aches. And the people—person—he’d want that from the most is the one most certain to pull away with disdain and disgust. So he pushes the ache away and curls around his cat or his computer or a pillow, because he knows he’s a lonely person. He’s not a people person; lonely is normal. He doesn’t need people or contact like the others might. Because he likes being alone, right?


End file.
